The Curtain Call for 20th Anniversary Performance of The Lion King on Broadway at The Minskoff Theatre
(Walter McBride)

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Kyle Lamar Mitchell was 10-years-old when he saw his first Broadway show, a new musical called The Lion King. As much as she struggled as a single parent, his mother loved exposing her children to theater and culture.

The little boy sat mesmerized in the mezzanine. But one moment was truly mind-blowing. “Simba was talking about his journey. And all of the sudden out of nowhere Mufasa’s face appeared to him in the night sky,” recalls Mitchell. “It was the most magical thing I had ever seen. It was that feeling in the pit of your stomach. That moment before you’re about about to cry. That feeling when you’re on top of the roller coaster and just start to fall. It’s love.”

At that moment, he knew exactly what he wanted to do with his life. “I fell in love with theater and the feeling that it can teleport you to another time, a safe space where anything can happen,” he explains. “I turned to my mom and said, ‘Mommy, when I grow up I’m going to be on Broadway and in The Lion King. I’m going to play Simba.’ She said, ‘That sounds like a great idea.’”

Years later, after graduating from Yale and doing theater every chance he got, Mitchell was cast to understudy Simba in The Lion King. He has been in the production for four years. “I say shine bright and never be afraid of the light within you. Because you have something special to share with the rest of the world,” says Mitchell. “Never be afraid of that.”

For two decades The Lion King has transformed lives around the world. 24 productions have been seen by more than 90 million people. “The beauty of The Lion King is many-fold, but one of the things that theater does is take people not just into the joyous part of a theater experience, but also through life happenings whether it’s a death in the family or an illness. Theater has always been there to take communities through dark times,” says director Julie Taymor, who became the first woman to win a Tony award for directing a musical. “What is so powerful about this show is that it has a deep spiritual base. Audiences get that immediately. In our mechanized world, where everything is in black mirrors in our little phones, there is a humanness to this fable that is healing.”

Taymor had the challenge of translating the 1994 animated film to the stage. She wondered how to put on a show on that was all animals yet would still be very human. Or how could she create a stampede? But she discovered a way to do so that continues to resonate around the planet. Produced by Disney Theatrical Productions (under the direction of Thomas Schumacher), The Lion King is performed in eight different languages (including Korean, Dutch, Mandarin and Portuguese) in 19 countries on every continent except Antarctica.

This past Sunday, Taymor, The Lion King’s creative team and hundreds of alumni who performed in the show over the years (including Heather Headley, Caleb McLaughlin from Stranger Things and Hamilton stars Chris Jackson and Renée Elise Goldsberry) attended a special performance to celebrate The Lion King’s 20 years on Broadway.

After the heart-stopping show, with the most enthusiastic audience jumping out of their seats crying with joy, it seemed like it couldn’t get any more exciting. But then the evening ended with a surprise performance by The Lion King’s Tony-nominated composer Sir Elton John, who sang “Circle of Life,” with the show’s company.

Before the 20th anniversary performance began, Heather Headley, the show’s original Nala reflected on The Lion King’s beginnings. Back in 1997, before they opened, they did a preview for the media. “We were presenting some of what we were doing. I remember sneaking in to the side of the theater, a little cubby where no one could see me,” remembers Headley. “I was standing there and Julie Taymor came beside me. Everything went dark. The light came up. The sun was there. They started ‘Nants Ingonyama.’ The giraffes came across. I remember grabbing Julie and starting to weep. At that moment I thought, I am a part of something that is beyond me. We are at the foot of something amazing.”

Watch highlights below.

Click the slideshow to see photos from The Lion King’s 20 years on Broadway celebration.

At the 20th Anniversary Performance of The Lion King, Elton John performed with the show's cast.

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